Door-operating mechanism for swinging doors of garages and the like



'Dec. 25, 1928..

I G. H. BRIDGEWATER El AL noon OPERATING mmcnmxsm FOR SWINGING nooas OFGARAGES AND THE LIKE Filed Nov. 21, 1924 Patented Dec. 25,1923. P

pairs n 'srA'r-ss herein?! GEORGE H. isnrnonwa'rnn, or .MARYVILLE, AND CHARLES M. GOBEN, oF'ooLLrNs p v I VILLE, ILLINOIS. p g

DOOR-OPERATING ivrnonnnrsn ro e swrnerive no'ons or eA'nAGEsAND rHaLIK-n.

Application filed November 21,"1924f Serial No. 751;381.

This invention relates to tin-improvement in door operating mechanisms andhas for :itsprimaryobject the purpose-of providing an improved combination and relation of parts which are co-operable with the doors of agaragefor opening and closing the doors upon the approach of au a-utomobile inwhich the Wei ht of theforward movingpart' of the automolii from either side.

. viding an improved form of mechanism in driving spiral portion 8 and formed out-he connection with'the hinges ofthe doors for 'turningthehlnges and the doors wh ch are mounted on the hinges; w 7 Other and further objects will appear in the specification and be specifically pointed out in the appended claims; reference being had to the accompanying drawings, exenr plifyingthe invention, and in which Figure 1 is'a front elevation of a garage having afragmentary portionthereof broken away and showing this improved dooryoperatin'g mechanism applied thereto.

Figure 2 is a fragmentary vertical section taken approximately ontie line II+II of Fig. 1. Y

I Figure 3 is a fragmentary horizontal section taken on the line Hl-II Iof Fig. 1.

With reference to the accompanying drawings, thegarage 1 is provided with a pair of relatable'swing1ngdoors2 and 3 and secured to each door on the-hinging end thereof is a vertically disposed strap 4 each being provided at its upperend-with vertically'jdisposed pintle 5 and formed in the lower end of eachstrap} is a pintle 6, each pint-1e Sbe ng ourn'aled in a bearing 7,said bearingsbeing secured to the front wall I of the garage 1.

c Formed onthe lower end of the strap {l of the door Q-above the pintle 6 is a left'hand lower end-of the strap 4. ofthe door above the pintle is a right hand driving spiral portion 9, and mounted over each of said spiral portions is'a'coil springiiO.

Mounted on the upper end of each of the springs 10 is a respective bifurcated plate 11 each being horizontally extended from a horizontally disposed beam 12, the height of each of said springs 10 being such wherein the beam 12 will be normally disposed at the upper end of each of the respective spiralpon tions 8 and 9. I a

The doors 2 and 3 are adapted to swing outile will operate the doors to "open i wardlyias shown in Fig. 2, and leading to the doors from the outside oft-he garage is an approach platform 18 which is supported upon apair of longitudinally disposed sills 14, said plat-found?) being upwardly inclined towards the: doors i2 and 3, the lower disposed end of each of the sills being provided with a shoeqoicachof which is swingingly securedto a respective ll-bolt 16 which are secured to a transversely disposed sill 1'7, the

opposite ends of said sills 13resting upon the beam 12. y

Disposedinteriorly of the garage-andleading upwardly tot-he doorsis an inclined platform 18 mounted upon'a pair of longitudia sills :19 each having a bracket 23 secured nally disposed sills 19 eachhaving a hinging bracket 20 secured at its lower end, each of said brackets bein gloosely secured to a'U- bolt 21,-said li 'bolt-s being mounted to the thereto, each of said 'brackets being provided with a'sl'ot 24i-and'borneby 'each of the sills "1:4 at-their upper arranged endsis a pin or bolt 25 each bolt beinge'ng'aged ina respective slot -2 l 'ofa respective bracket 23 ofeach of the sills l9-ofttheplatform '18. 1

Inasmuch as the beam "12 is normally held in an elevated position by the coil sp'rings 10, in a consequence t'here'of the platforms '13 and 18 are normally inclined upwardly 1 towards each other as disclosed in-FigQQ, of thedrawc ings and upon the appro-achof a vehicle along the driveway 26 the forwardly approaching"wheels ofthevehiele 'u1'3o'n='e11gaging the {lower inclined end of theplatform18 will cause. the platform to swing downwardly in which the upper inclined ends of the sills l fe will bear downwardly on the beam 12, the

weight of-the automobile traveling upwardly r on the pile tfornr continuing to 'force ithe platform and beam 12 downwardly"against the pressureof the coil springs 10. 'Tl'risdownwardjactionof the bifurcated platesflll of the beam 12 upon the -respective1 spiral portions -8 audit) will'causethe strap 40f the door Qto turn in a left hand direction whereas the strap 4: of the door 3 will be turned in' a right hand Y direction thereby simultaneously swinging both of said doors outwardly as the beam 12 is pressed further downwardly by the upward travel of the vehicle upon the platform 13. It is obvious that as the leverage of the platform 13 increases as theve hide rr ach the g eremief the P at loo form the compression of the springs 10 will also be increased therefore compressing of said springs will be comparatively slow and as the spiral portions 8 and 9 are designed so that but an approximate one-quarter turn will only be given to each'of the doors 2 and 3, when the beam 12 has reached the traveling length of each of the spiral portions, said beam will engage and rest upon the supporting blocks 27 of which there are a pair as shown by dotted lines in Fig. 2.

()n account of the fact that the upper ends of the sills19 of the platform 18 are secured to the upper ends of the sills 14 of the platform 13 by the bolts 25 passing through the sills of respective brackets 23 of the sills 19, it is obvious that the upper inclinedend of the platform 18 was moved downwardly with the downward movement of the platform 13 therefor when the forwardly traveling wheels of the vehicle reaches the upper inclined end of the platform 13, the platform 18 will be rcadil en 'a 'ed b r the forwardl travely e m 3 ing wheels so that the vehicle can travel downwardly on the platform 18 to the garage floor 28, the weight of the rearwardly following wheels of the vehicle upon the platform 18 holding both of the platforms down as well as the beam 12 and consequently said beam will hold the straps 4 in their turned positions so that the doors will be kept open until the vehicle has entered the garage. As the rearwardly traveling wheels of the vehicle travels slowly down the plat form 18, the weight will be gradually relieved from the upper inclined end of the platform 18 and the coil springs 10 will begin to become active upon the beam 12 therer v by forcing the beam slowly upwardlyv and the respective'bifurcated plates 11 will become active upon the door straps 4 thereby turning each of said straps in the opposite direc- 'tion to which they were turned when the .force of the plates 11 was downward upon the spiral portions 8 and 9, said return movement of each of the straps 4: closing the doors 2and3. r V

For locking the doors against an intruder, who might without authority desire to open the doors by driving the unauthorized. vchicle upon the platform 13 for the purpose of gaining access to the garage, a reciprocal bolt 29 is'disposed upon respective supports 30 which are disposed interiorly of the garage for the purpose of undercngaging re spective bifurcated plates 11 of the beam 12 lever 32, the slot of each leverbeing engaged over a pin 33 which is extended from the rear end of eachof the bolts 29 and secured to one end of the shaft 31 is the throw lever 34 having a connecting link 35 secured thereto, the opposite end of the link being secured to a bell crank lever 36. From the disclosure of Fig. 2 when the lever 36 is i moved in the direction of the arrow 37 the link 35 will be drawn upwardly thereby rocking the shaft 31 and the levers 32, each of which is securedto a respectivebolt 29, will force said bolts outwardly and beneath respective plates 11 of the beam-12. The lever 36 being operated in the reverse direction will withdraw said bolts. x v

V 7 Upon moving the vehicle towards the doors for disposing it outside of the garage, the forwardly traveling wheels of the vehicle upon engaging and upwardly traveling on the platform 18, will force the beam 12 downwardly against the pressure of the coil springs 8 and the door straps 4 will be turned in the same manner as was effected by the vehicle when the vehicle'was entering the garage upon the platform 13.

vVhat we claim is V In a door operating device, apair of horizontally sw-ingable doors, a metallic strap se cured to each door extending the vertical length thereof and above and below respective doors,a pintle formed at each end of said straps, supporting means'foreach pin tle, theportions of said straps which extend below-send doors, each being tw stedso as to form a spiral portion, a horizontally disposed depressible member having a bifurcated portion at each end for engagement with respectivc spiral portions of said straps, resilient means underengaging said depressible member, and a pair of oppositely arranged inclined platforms each having one end. resting on said depressihle member.

' 4 GEORGE H. BRIDGEVVATER.

CHAS. M. GOBEN. 

